ECONOMIC DEMOCRACY CONFERENCE

Americans have less and less control over their economic lives and almost no say on the direction of the economy. Their jobs are insecure, wages are stagnating, debts are growing, retirement is underfunded and a health care crisis could wipe them out. At the same, the wealthiest are getting wealthier, controlling a greater share of the wealth than any time in U.S. history. Their connections to political leadership ensure that economic elites face little risk in our crony capitalist economy.

While many Americans are in a race to the bottom, the tiny percentage at the top of the economy is racing to the stratosphere of unimaginable wealth.

Around the world in Spain, Greece, Egypt, Tunisia . . . the people are revolting against austerity and oligarchs controlling wealth. In fact, the wealth divide in the U.S., where the top 1% has wealth equal to the bottom 95%, is even greater than in these other nations.

What is the next evolution of the U.S. economy? How can it be reshaped so that people gain greater control of their lives and greater influence over the economy? Democratizing the economy would move the United States away from crony capitalism and create an economy where wealth is more equitably shared. People are already putting in place programs that democratize the economy, giving them greater influence and control over their economic lives.

The Economic Democracy Conference will bring together people who are working on the front lines to:

Build sustainable local living economies

Democratize the money supply

Create publicly owned banks

Create worker and consumer owned and operated businesses

Develop participatory budgets

Fight and prevent foreclosures

Fight for health care reform and alternative health delivery systems

It's Our Economy and the Public Banking Institute are the principal conveners of the Economic Democracy Conference. Contact Margaret Flowers at mdpnhp@gmail.com for more info.

Is there an America beyond capitalism? Something is brewing beneath the social and economic
distress—including thousands of worker-owned companies, co-ops with millions of members,
states taking up public banking, and other new forms of single-payer health care. Throughout
the U.S., we have already seen nationalizations, and likely future crises will produce more—
some in a much more democratized direction. This may be the prehistory of the next American
revolution, one that could democratize the current political-economic system and make it both
morally meaningful and ecologically sustainable.

It's time to make the break from "dirty, carbon-based fuels” for the sake of public health and the planet. Across the country, public support by Republicans, Democrats and Independents for solar and wind renewable energy is at an all-time high ranging from 60-80% respectively. Lacking strong federal policy, states are the laboratories for new public policy, innovative legal and financing solutions, and green energy production that are proven to produce green jobs. This workshop will highlight Wisconsin’s strategies, campaigns and success to meet mandated goals for CO2 reduction, as well as on-going challenges.

It’s clear things are not going well for any but the 1%, but what to do about it is the fundamental
question we now need to face. While the present system is obviously failing us, a movement offering no coherent vision to replace it is no less doomed to failure. Presented by People For A New Society, this workshop will include a short powerpoint presentation and focus on how the changes already underway can create an effective strategy to transform and build a new vision of society based on a sustainable, grassroots democracy: post-capitalism, post-profit and post-wage. Imagination and creative thinking is invited; serious interest in building a new society is welcome.

Corporations are legally responsible to create maximum profit for their investors without regard to impact on people or the planet. That is changing with a new kind of corporate charter, the B Corp or Beneficial Corporation requires that businesses meet higher standards for social and environmental performance and accountability. Nineteen states have passed laws to permit B Corps so far. Learn more about B Corps, and how to make them a reality for your state or business.

This panel discussion will examine the relationship between the changing conditions of the economy and our public education system, at all levels. Our panelists will discuss how the corporate assault attempts to dismantle the educational system, and to remake it under corporate designs in order to conform to conditions of austerity via: turn around schools, school closures, voucherization and charterization of neighborhood schools, cuts to electives and remedial programs, vocationalization of adult education, and corporatization of research universities driving the transformation of education which leads to the disenfranchisement of faculty and staff, and students, especially first generation college students of color.

This workshop will discuss that the costs of our basic needs like healthcare, housing, and education are all rising rapidly, yet our means to meet these needs have flatlined. Although worker productivity has risen steadily since WWII, wages have remained the same since the late 1970s. This forces us in debt. Debt is a tool of oppression, and part of its power to oppress is that it isolates and atomizes us. I want to pose the question of what are true debts are to one another. We are defaulting on our true debts because we are forced to pay illegitimate debts to the 1%.

As the housing market has revealed itself to be subject to the arbitrary winds of Wall Street and fraud in the banking industry, people are creating alternative ways to provide permanently affordable housing. Greg Rosenberg, Executive Director of the National Community Land Trust Network, will describe how land trusts across the country are promoting sustainable development through permanently affordable housing and the protection of working lands. Michael Carlson of the Madison Community Cooperatives, a federation of housing cooperatives that formed in 1968, will describe how co-ops create affordable housing for people with low-incomes and gives them greater control over their living environment.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the largest lobby group in the U.S. and spends hundreds of
millions of dollars each year to advance a platform centered on cutting public services, dismantling
workers rights, and denying climate science. Learn how you can get involved in Liberty Tree’s Shut the Chamber Campaign by taking part in days of action where you live and by encouraging your neighborhood small businesses and local chambers of commerce to divest from the U.S. Chamber (and its state affiliates) and instead join a business alliance that supports strong communities.

Are you tired of reading articles about how Wall Street is bankrupting us? Do you despair about financing the transition to a green economy? Are you ready to roll up your sleeves and start changing the system but you don’t know where to begin? Public banks are a way for us to take back control and to finance the transition to a green, sustainable economy. You can organize to create a city, county or state public bank. This interactive workshop will give you a chance to ask questions and will suggest tools and resources to use in organizing. Let’s begin!

The Trans-Pacific Partnership will fundamentally change the global economy in a way that further entrenches global corporate power and gives multinational corporations the power to challenge national environmental, labor and consumer protection laws in a rigged court system. The TPP will affect every aspect of our lives from wages to the environment to access to medicine and internet freedom. Rather than a trade treaty, the TPP is a corporate property protection act. A global campaign is underway to stop the TPP. Learn more about what it is and how you can join the campaign to “Flush the TPP.”

This plenary will examine the big picture of our financial system and why it results in a growing wealth divide, a race to the bottom in the wellbeing of most people and destruction of communities and the environment. A new system is growing within the current one that is based on values of shared prosperity, real democracy, cooperation and sustainability. Around the world, these new systems are designed to put the interests of people and the planet before profits. We will describe what is happening and what is ahead.

For the first time in human history, it is possible to democratize the money creation process. We will see that it’s not the structure of the economy or the hue of the political solution, per se, that are the real problems but money and the monetary system itself, and not in the way one might first suspect. Since money is a human invention, it can be changed. Not only is there another way but a multiplicity of ways to rethink money. A quiet evolution already is underway, in which people and their communities are helping themselves and each other through a new understanding of money.

The number of cooperative businesses is growing in the US as workers discover the benefits and challenges of running their businesses in a democratic way. John Conowall will discuss how and why cooperatives work, how to get started creating a cooperative business and will share his experiences of building Madison Worker Cooperatives and the Dane Cooperative Alliance. He will talk about what some of the keys are to success and how to avoid common pitfalls, as well as ways that co-operatives can work together to create a thriving local economy.

This workshop is designed to review movements to create public banks in communities and states across the US and explore paradigms of social banking and economic democracy from abroad for these efforts. Participants are encouraged to explore materials in the Public Bank Course wikispace http://publicbankcourse.wikispaces.com/home. Case studies from abroad will emphasize 1) the competitive advantages of public banks over private banks 2) the policy capacities of public banks, especially in terms of providing counter-cyclical credit and as agents of social inclusion and 3) how savings banks in advanced and developing countries have sustained and accelerated social inclusion.

There are three alternative ways that people are taking to form a public bank -- forming a coalition (grassroots), forcing the issue (surgical strike), and running candidates (throw the bums out!). A review of each of these alternatives will be provided, along with the pros/cons and identification of what makes the best sense in your community.

Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC) is the largest lobby group in the Wisconsin and
spends millions of dollars each year to advance a platform centered on cutting public services,
dismantling workers rights, and weakening environmental protections. Learn how you can get
involved in Wisconsin’s Shut the Chamber! Campaign by taking part in days of action where you
live and by encouraging small businesses and local chambers of commerce to divest from WMC
(and the U.S. Chamber) and instead join a business alliance that supports strong communities.
While this workshop will focus on Wisconsin, the campaign is a national effort; all are welcome!

The keynote address will be followed by a facilitated discussion to give each conference a chance
to share the big ideas that came out of their event as well as the next steps everyone can take to further the democracy movement in the months and years ahead.

It’s Our Economy seeks to educate, organize and mobilize Americans to shift the power from concentrated capital to the people. We work to create an economy that is democratized, where people have greater control over their economic lives and greater influence over the direction of the economy. A critical ingredient for creating a real democracy where the people’s voices are heard requires creating a democratized economy in which people have more influence, crony capitalism that created the wealth divide is ended and the necessities of Americans are met. We seek to empower Americans to organize an uncompromising independent movement that takes power from the economic elites and redistributes it to the people.

The Democracy Convention is a project of Liberty Tree. Liberty Tree is uniquely committed to building a new democracy movement for the U.S.A.. We provide vital support to grassroots campaigns for democratic reform in many areas of American life, and bring those campaigns together to form a united movement for democracy.

2011 Convention

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ABOUT THE CONVENTION

If you want to strengthen democracy where it matters most -- in our communities, our schools, our workplaces and local economies, our military, our government, our media, our constitution -- you will find something inspiring in Madison this August. Learn More →

ABOUT LIBERTY TREE

The Democracy Convention is a project of Liberty Tree, a strategy center uniquely committed to building a new democracy movement for the U.S.A.. Liberty Tree supports and unites campaigns for democratic reform across many areas of life.